Sweet Vengeance

by Fern Michaels

  “Are you all right?” Jill asked. “I can give you something if you need it.”

  Tessa gave her a halfhearted smile. She pointed to the ankle monitor. “Rules. No alcohol. No drugs. But I appreciate your concern. I’m going to be . . . I’m dealing with this now.” She looked at Rosa, who was cowering in her chair. The woman was afraid, there was no doubt about that. But she was no longer in fear of deportation, and according to Lee, her entire family were all now legal citizens. What else could she possibly have to be afraid of?

  “Are you sure you want to listen in?” Lee asked her. “I can do this at the office.”

  “No. I’m fine. Just do what you have to do.” Tessa never wavered as she said this, looking at Rosa the entire time. “I want to hear what happened in my house the day my family was slaughtered.” She remembered that word, the very one that had been used by the prosecution and the media to describe what she had supposedly done before she left for San Maribel on Friday.

  Lee nodded and turned to Rosa.

  “Rosa, did you hear anything specific from the younger Mr. Jamison? From Liam Jamison?”

  Rosa nodded.

  “Tell us what you heard him say,” Lee instructed. “Word for word.”

  Chapter 20

  Almost immediately after Lee said this, his cell phone buzzed, and he excused himself to take the call.

  The tension in the room intensified when he left the room. Rosa squirmed in her chair, trying not to focus on Tessa.

  Tessa had a dozen questions floating through her mind. So Liam had been here that day, not in Japan as she had been led to believe before going to San Maribel. Just as she had always been sure of, he was the person who killed her family. But who was the third man? Someone from Jamison Pharmaceuticals? And if so, who would come to their home? What was being argued about? The company was stable and thriving, though she had to admit she hadn’t been involved in the day-to-day operations since she had left her position to start a family. Joel never complained to her about the inner workings of the company. She had just assumed that there wasn’t anything to complain about. They were a healthy, happy family, blessed with loving children. Their lives hadn’t been perfect, but close.

  Or so she had thought.

  Lee returned. “Tessa, I need to speak to you and Sam.”

  Her pulse increased again, and for a minute, she feared that her heart would burst from her chest.

  “Jill?” she asked.

  “You mind waiting here?” Lee asked Jill, nodding in Rosa’s direction.

  “Not at all,” Jill said.

  Tessa knew this was Lee’s way of asking Jill to watch Rosa, make sure she didn’t decide to disappear again.

  As soon as they were out of eavesdropping range, Lee spoke. “That was Harry. He says the watch stopped on the date it showed, said it was hit, slammed against something hard enough to do the damage. There’s DNA on it, too.”

  “That can’t be right! Sam said that he packed up Joel’s desk, and the watch was in his desk. It’s impossible, right? He couldn’t have put it in his desk, not then. He wasn’t alive.”

  “I’m just telling you what Harry said. The impact on the watch, by whatever means, caused it to stop on the day of the murders. That means the murders occurred on Saturday, not Friday. It supports Rosa’s story about her last day working being on Saturday, not Friday. As to how the watch got to Joel’s office, I’m sure there is an explanation, but I haven’t a clue what it could be. But I will find out, I promise,” Lee said.

  Tessa had taken in so much information in the past forty-eight hours, she couldn’t process this last bit. “Have you given this information to the district attorney?”

  “Not yet. I wanted to tell you first.”

  “What’s Harry’s plan on the DNA?” Sam asked.

  “He’ll run it against the samples taken at the scene, see if there’s a match.”

  “A match? Who else’s DNA would be on that watch, other than Joel’s?”

  “That’s Harry’s job to find out. Remember, Rachelle will be at my office tomorrow morning, and she’s agreed to give a DNA sample. If Liam’s DNA is on that watch, it’s just one more fact to take to the DA.”

  Tessa dropped her head in her hands. Her head was pounding, and she was feeling nauseated. “So you’re saying that Joel’s watch might have stopped during a fight or something, and if Liam’s DNA shows up on the watch . . . What does this mean?”

  “Let’s wait for Harry. He knows the case, knows what to look for. We will get to the bottom of this. I’m going to call Michael Chen right now. Sam, you okay with questioning Rosa? I don’t want her taking off or thinking she’s off the hook. The events that took place, at least those she witnessed, need to be documented. I want her scared. And don’t be easy on her.”

  “I can do that,” Sam agreed. “You leaving now?”

  “I want to get to Chen before any of this makes the evening news. The damned media are still stalking the neighborhood. We need to stay alert until we figure this out. Maybe I can get Chen and Judge Crider, the old son of a bitch, to dismiss the charges since the murders could not have happened on Friday as the state alleged. At the very least, get him to give us a date for a new trial. Something they can focus on while we investigate.

  “If the evidence I have to take to the judge holds up, there won’t be a need for a new trial. Now, Sam, Tessa, go see what else Rosa knows. I’ll see you both tomorrow morning at my office, that is, if you want to see Rachelle?”

  “I do,” Tessa replied. “I want to look into her eyes and tell her what an evil bastard she gave birth to.”

  “I understand. Now, Sam, go before she relaxes, gets too comfortable. I’ll call if there’s anything new to report.”

  Tessa and Sam returned to the living room. Rosa remained as she was. Jill had moved to the sofa and was sitting near the end closest to Rosa.

  “Lee had to leave. A big break in the case. I’m going to continue with the questions, Rosa. I’m an attorney and have been working alongside Lee, so I’m as familiar with the case as he is. However, you may leave at any time; that’s your legal right. But we will issue a subpoena when and if this goes to court. You will be forced to testify to what you saw and heard.”

  Her face paled. “But I thought if I told you what I saw . . . there would be no court, no trial.”

  “It’s a possibility, but there are no guarantees. Those papers you signed, it’s all clearly outlined. Up to you, Rosa.”

  Tessa could see that Sam was not going to be as sympathetic and objective as Lee.

  “I will tell you what I saw,” Rosa said. “I want to help Miss Tessa.”

  Sure she does, Tessa thought. That’s why it took her ten years to decide to come out with what she had to say. Tessa wanted to slap her silly. The pent-up anger she had kept hidden all these years was not going to remain inside. It was ready to explode. But she would control her violent thoughts, both because it was not in her nature to be this way and because she did not want to end up in jail this time for a crime that she did commit. Unless it was for killing Liam Jamison, that son of a bitch.

  Nonetheless, the thought of harming this woman who had changed the course of her life was there, and Tessa thought that given what she had been through, her feelings were probably a natural reaction.

  Sam took the legal pad Lee had left him, read through the list of questions, then put it aside. He took his cell phone and set it up to continue recording Rosa’s testimony.

  “We left off with you about to tell us what you heard the younger Mr. Jamison, Liam Jamison, say.”

  Rosa pulled herself upright again, her upper body perfectly straight. “How should I say this?”

  “Any way you’re comfortable. As long as it’s the truth,” Sam said.

  He was not cutting Rosa any slack. Tessa appreciated this more than he knew. She needed someone on her side this time around. Someone who believed in her. Sam McQuade believed in her.

  Jill sat beside her ag
ain, but this time she wasn’t as relaxed. Maybe she didn’t trust Sam. Lee was good, but if he trusted Sam in his place, then Tessa would, too. She whispered to Jill, “It’s okay. Sam knows what he’s doing.”

  “You read me well,” Jill whispered back.

  Sam cleared his throat. “Rosa?”

  She nodded. “I was at the bottom of the steps, and they were arguing. I was very frightened—”

  “Rosa, you have said that more than once. I want to know what you heard Liam Jamison say.”

  “He said to Mr. Joel . . .” Rosa’s eyes suddenly filled with tears. She took another tissue from her pocket and blotted her tears. “He said that he knew about the girls.”

  Tessa actually felt the color drain from her face. Her hands started shaking. She took a deep breath. “What do you mean?” She could hardly get the words out of her mouth.

  Rosa’s head bobbed up and down, her bun finally coming completely undone. She didn’t bother trying to fix it again. “He said he knew about the girls.”

  She looked at Sam, praying he would get her to clarify what she had just said.

  “Liam Jamison said he knew about the girls?” Sam asked her again. “You heard him say those exact words to Joel? Is that what you’re saying?”

  Rosa nodded.

  “Is that all you heard?” Sam asked.

  “No.”

  The room was as silent as a tomb. Tessa felt as though she had stepped out of her body and was looking down on Jill, Sam, and Rosa from high overhead. The word surreal came to mind. An out-of-body experience.

  “Tell us what you heard,” Sam persisted. “Exactly as you heard it being said.”

  Tessa watched Rosa. She could see that this wasn’t easy for her, but again, she could have made a massive difference all those years ago and had chosen not to. She reminded herself of this each time she started to feel the least bit of sympathy for the woman she had trusted with her daughters’ lives.

  “I . . . I heard him tell Mr. Jamison that he knew about the girls. That’s how he said it. I swear to you,” Rosa repeated. “Just like that. He said he knew about the girls.”

  “Okay,” Sam said. “Did you hear him say what he knew about the girls?”

  She shook her head. “That is all I heard. He did not say . . .” Rosa appeared to be searching for the right words. “Specifically. Yes, that is it. He did not say specifically what it was that he knew.”

  Tessa couldn’t remain silent. “You’re saying that Liam said that to Joel? Not the other way around?”

  Again, Rosa nodded.

  “I think you’re confused,” Tessa told her. “You’re not telling the truth.”

  “Tess,” Sam chided. “Let me do my job.”

  How could he expect her to keep quiet?

  “Calm down, Tessa,” Jill said reassuringly. “Let Sam finish what he needs to do.”

  Tessa sighed, exerting an iron will of control, then motioned for Sam to continue with his questions. The mood in the room was grim, dark. She had a fleeting thought, wondering if this is how her girls felt when they’d heard the arguing that morning in the kitchen. If that’s what they heard, and still, she wasn’t convinced Rosa was telling the complete truth.

  “So, you are at the bottom of the staircase, you hear both Mr. Jamisons, Joel and Liam, arguing,” Sam stated in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. “Liam says to Joel, ‘I know about the girls’ and you just continue to stand at the bottom of the stairs?”

  “I was very afraid and wanted to take the girls to their rooms upstairs, and I was about to when the loud banging started on the front door. They stopped shouting.” Rosa looked down, reached for her wadded-up tissue, and blew her nose. “I waited, too. I thought it was Roberto coming to get me, but then I realized that he could not have gotten here so fast. You know? It had only been a few minutes since I had called him. He worked over on Alhambra Drive, not all that far from here, but it still takes at least ten minutes to get from there to here. So I waited to see who was at the door knocking so loudly. I thought maybe Miss Tessa had come back, but it could not be her because she had keys. And she always came in through the garage and entered the house through the kitchen door.”

  Sam looked at Tessa for confirmation.

  “At least that’s true,” she said.

  “Go on,” Sam coaxed Rosa.

  “Mr. Jamison, Mr. Joel, answered the door, and Mr. Liam followed him. I thought that now is my chance, so I ran to the kitchen and told both girls to go out to the pool immediately. They did as I said. No questions because I think they did not want to hear their father and uncle yelling in front of them. They had shorts on, no swimwear, but I said to them, hurry out and go swim.”

  “Stop!” Tessa shouted, no longer caring what Sam or Jill said. “How in God’s name could you not come forth with this information? I have spent a decade rotting in a prison cell! I lost my family, Rosa! Everything dear to me was taken that day, all that I loved . . . and you . . . you just up and left. You walked out the door just like it was a normal day. How could you?” Her voice was loud and harsh, but she no longer cared.

  Sitting here and listening to Rosa talk about that day as though it were just any other cleaning day at the Jamison residence made her seethe with rage. She didn’t care whether her words hurt Rosa or not. Glaring at the woman, knowing her eyes shone with hot anger, she could not stop herself. “You’re nothing but a coward, you know that? You left two innocent little girls alone to . . . die!”

  “Miss Tessa—”

  “Shut up! You. Ruined. My. Life. You. Watched. My. Family. Die!” She spat the words so contemptuously, she surprised herself.

  Sam held up his hand. “Calm down, Tess. We’re not getting anything accomplished. I understand your anger. We all do. We will find out the truth. No matter what. I swear.” He said this while staring at Rosa.

  “I am very sorry, Miss Tessa. I cannot change what I did that day and afterward. I live with it every day of my life. I am not a happy woman. I . . .” She blotted her eyes again. “I pray for their souls at church. I swear to you.” At that admission, Rosa began to sob in earnest, then genuflected. Tessa felt a twinge of compassion for the woman, but only a twinge.

  “Jill, why don’t you and Tess get us something to drink?” Sam asked. “I think we could use a break.”

  “Come on, Tessa.” Jill took her friend by the hand and led her into the kitchen.

  For a minute, neither spoke as Tessa removed glasses from the cupboard while Jill took four cans of Coke from the refrigerator. Tess filled each glass with ice, found a tray, and placed the glasses on it, along with the Cokes. “Why do I feel like strangling the life out of that woman? Can you tell me that? I can barely stand to look at her,” Tessa said.

  “I don’t know of anyone in their right mind who wouldn’t feel exactly as you do. Her inaction has changed many lives, Tessa. As long as you’re not planning on acting on those thoughts, as a psychiatrist, I would tell you your reaction is perfectly normal.”

  If she only knew how serious she was, but even through her rage it wasn’t Rosa she ultimately wanted to punish.

  It was Liam.

  Chapter 21

  Twenty minutes later, after they’d had a chance to calm down, and Tessa was in control of her emotions, Sam asked Rosa if she wanted to go home or continue.

  “I will stay as long as I need to,” Rosa told him. “I want to help. Honestly.”

  “Okay, let’s go back to your telling the girls to go to the pool. What did you do next?”

  “I thought I needed to watch the girls, so I slipped inside the pool house. I could watch them from the window. The girls seemed okay, and they sat by the edge of the big pool. First they put their feet in the water, then, a few minutes later, they got into the pool. It was okay for them to do that; they were very good swimmers, but Miss Tessa always wanted me to watch them at the poolside. I always did.” Rosa closed her eyes. “I stayed by the window and watched.”

  “How long?” S
am questioned.

  Tessa’s heart was beating so fast, she had to take several deep breaths to calm herself.

  “I think it was at least half an hour.”

  “And during this time that you were in the pool house, watching the girls, did you see anything unusual, hear anything?” Sam asked.

  “No, not then. I just watched Poppy and Piper playing in the pool. They were having fun.”

  Tessa could visualize both girls in their pool. They had all kinds of games they played, some were the usual. Marco Polo. Dive for gold. Mermaids. And they had their own games they’d made up, which consisted of going underwater to see who could hold her breath longer. It was something she did not approve of, and she had told them so, but she knew they still played the game, and as long as they didn’t take it too far, she hadn’t told them she knew. Another was to close their eyes, float on their backs, and see where they ended up when they decided to open their eyes. Endless games that were, for the most part, harmless, but Tessa insisted an adult be at the pool when they were swimming, or playing, despite the fact that both were excellent swimmers.

  “You watched the girls playing for half an hour and saw nothing unusual. What did you see after the half hour you watched the girls swimming?” Sam asked, and Tessa could hear the impatience in his voice. He was walking her through her story like a child, and she knew why, but it was frustrating, to say the least, to sit here and listen to Rosa tell about her memories of that fateful day.

  “Mr. Jamison came out to the pool area, the living area. Liam followed him, and that other man.”

  “Who was the other man you saw?”

  Rosa looked down again, then met Tessa’s stare. “I had not seen this man ever, but I had seen him. Sort of.”

  Sam was losing his patience, Tessa could tell. He rolled his shoulders, raked his hand through his hair, took another sip of his soft drink. “Okay, Rosa, you’re not being very clear. Explain what you mean by you had seen this other man, ‘sort of.’ ”

  “He was . . . like Mr. Jamison. Like Joel.”